Economic recovery could be bad news for Germany

News that Germany and France have, with a mini-bound, escaped recession must be the most ominous development of the week.

Though it has always proved a mirage in the past, the possibility of change had appeared to be taking hold in Germany. The economic doldrums had the Germans thinking outside the mould imposed since the 1950s by its two big political parties and a seamless spectrum of trade unions and big business.

For those within this system, Germany had been an extremely comfortable place until the downturn. But the apparent failure of its export-driven social model changed all that. As a result, Germans had begun to campaign for a responsive political system.

People in the east were growing uneasy care about their disproportionate contribution to the armed services. Farmers in the south began to show frustration with the EU. Metropolitans had begun to favour a more entrepreneurial society, sensing that services and lifestyle industries would play a bigger role in the country's future.

In all sorts of ways, Germans had begun to realise that the economy – and thence German society – had reached the end of the post-war path. The worry is that today's GDP figures will drive them back to the old, familiar way of thinking.